Don't let go of your giddy.

It’s not hard to remember the Christmases of my childhood. That nervous mix of anticipation and joy. The butterflies. The giddy excitement.

What is hard? Trying to access that feeling again. As an adult. Snarky and easily annoyed. Christmas magic = over-marketed hype. It used to be different. Better. Because we waited all year. To get presents, to sing songs, to watch Specials on tv.

Just the percussion on the CBS indentifier is nostalgia overload! 

Now stores start promoting Christmas in October and kids seem to get what they want when they want it. Including holiday Specials on dvd. Let’s watch The Grinch in April! The thrill of waiting is gone. 

I know I sound like my 85 year-old neighbor who frequently tells me how much better things were when her kids were small. Seriously. She works it in to most conversations, like there’s anything I can do about the fact that my kids are kids in 2011. The roads were less busy, people were less busy. Apparently bluebirds serenaded from her windowsill. It was real nice. Was, was, was.

I’m not like that. I don’t think the world today is awful. A mess maybe, but we’ve endured worse. When I’m down about the current state of affairs, I recall the Royal Mile in Edinburgh, Scotland. It’s a steep street that leads to the city’s castle. Once upon a time, those accused of crimes (meaning not necessarily guilty) were put in barrels with metal spikes and rolled down the hill. Ouch. If you survived, they took you back up for another go. People would come out to watch. Good entertainment in what was considered a very civilized town. And don’t get me started on the plague. Or slavery. Or petticoats in the heat, infant mortality, and the general lack of convenience associated with self sufficiency. I like grocery stores.

Even 50 years ago when my neighbor was hooping it up with her young family, there were lots of sordid happenings, we just didn’t talk about it or feature the details on 24 hour news channels. Many suffered in silence. La-dee-da. Slip on your penny loafers and smile.

(This post has taken a heavy turn and for that I apologize. See? Snarky and annoyed.)

What makes me think of all this now? Because there is something that still stirs my jagged, jaded soul. And the more I wait for it, the better it feels. Fall weather. No one’s trying to sell it to me. It just happens. When it’s good and ready. After a long, hot summer. After countless sticky, humid days. Crisp and breezy autumn air mixed with bright sunshine and billowy clouds will tie up my gut in knots of pure joy. The smell of leaves and apples. A warm cup of coffee in my hands on a cold morning. A refreshing sense of renewal that seems to wash away the summer muck.

So here’s my question for you to jot down, answer, and then put away. (If you’re doing the exercise explained in my first post, which I suspect many of you aren’t, though I wish you would.) When was the last time you felt a genuine wave of excited anticipation?

I think it might be 50 and windy on Sunday. Look for my next post to complain about putting coats on babies and putting (jamming, wrestling) bundled up babies in car seats.

My third baby has no baby book. Just a Rubbermaid tub.

Over the years, the baby books I bought for my older girls were eventually put in the bottom of a big plastic container where I now toss their artwork, birthday cards, doctor stats, team pictures, good test scores, certificates of achievement, you get it. I date everything first, then in it goes. And there it is.

I like this concept. It’s quick, organized, but not overwhelming and impossible to keep up.

In the theme of this blog and my books (read my first and only other blog entry for clarification), I’ve decided to start a collection of my own. Maybe I’ll add cards, but probably not artwork or my latest height, weight and head circumference.

Mostly, I plan to write. Put it in a box. This box, which I won at an auction last Saturday night when it was full of chocolate. 

Now it’s empty and I’m drinking a health shake. More on that later.

I encourage you to get a box, too. Or a tub. Maybe a basket. A bag? Your choice. Fun!

Next fill it with your thoughts. I will prompt you, if needed. One question every week conveniently written in purple. Write down the question, your answer, and don’t forget to date it. Then put it in your box, tub, basket or bag where it will wait patiently to be reread someday. A little piece of you on paper.

Want a real life example of this theory in action? Ha! I have one! It’s a Gap shopping bag full of notes from my best friend in 8th grade, who’s still my best friend by the way and whose handwriting hasn’t improved. Fifty plus folded squares of paper, each one funnier, sillier, more profoundly special than the next. This will be just like that, minus the raging pubescent hormones and references to Duran Duran. 

Now I have pictures from 8th grade. They are nice once you get past the ridiculous trends. (I wore a tie - yes, a skinny, navy, knit tie - to my aforementioned best friend’s batmitzvah and there is a whole album of that fashion disaster probably still sitting on her mother’s coffee table.) But my point. Pictures are great. Words are greater.

Ready for your first question to answer? It’s a good one.

Oprah says “do what you love.” Oh, Oprah. That’s very easily said when your Montecito mansion is already built and the lavendar fields are thriving. 

For most of us, we do what we need to do -- to earn a paycheck, care for our families, stay semi-healthy. Like this protein shake I’m currently sipping. Berries, yogurt, banana, spinach, flax seed and some strange powder the very enthusiatic vitamin store owner convinced me to buy after methodically decoding metabolic charts oblivious to Beazy’s desire to pry herself free from my arms.

So I ask, if you were to do anything else with your life, besides what you already do, what would that be? No need to factor in schooling or your current burdens (Beazy!). Pure fantasy. 

I know what I wouldn’t do. I wouldn’t do anything that puts me in constant contact with nature or away from the comforts of home. That is for sure. I’m not farming anything or living overseas where I need to “immerse.” I definitely wouldn’t pick the hospitality field. No restaurants or bed and breakfasts for me. People pleasing. Yuck. I wouldn’t choose the glamorous life of an actor or performer either. Bleh. Too much attention makes me extremely uncomfortable. Even this blog tests my nerves... and I only have three followers.

Now go get your paper and I’ll get mine. At work, at home, relaxing in your Montecito mansion, it will make today go faster. And add to your future in a way that’s impossible to measure.

Write on, sister! An inspired business and my brand new blog.

Welcome to my blog!

It’s a little or maybe a lot strange to use a modern forum to write about not using modern forums. Let me first admit that I love technology and social media and everything that’s fast and immediate. I like that I can turn on my computer and read about whatever or reach out to whomever.

But I also believe that we are losing so much when we don’t express ourselves in a way that is lasting and fulfilling.

Here’s the back story. Let’s get it over with.

My mother died when I was 18. I knew almost nothing about her apart from what she did for me. I was a typical teen and didn’t see the value of knowing more. She was a woman facing death and was not happy about it. Our relationship stunk and that is that. It didn’t help that she hated having her picture taken. Or that my father remarried quickly and we never talked about her again. Or that her three brothers subsequently dropped out of our lives. Sometimes I think, Oh yeah, I had a mother. Sad.

Then my sister, with whom I was very close, was diagnosed with late stage ovarian cancer when she was just 38 and the mother of young twins. She fought hard for two years but the disease spread beyond control. At home on hospice care, Gail had a few days of lucidity. She suddenly and ferociously became preoccupied with writing. (I think it had a lot to do with our mother. When she died, she disappeared.) We went searching for something to make it easier for Gail. We settled on pretty stationery. She wrote a deeply moving page and a half before losing consciousness.

There you have it, my “aha” moment. I started a small, completely local business printing books that help painlessly pull information to document your life. With a portion of every sale going to two great charities. Simple.

And now a blog to help promote the business which helps promote the (almost) lost art of writing. See, it all makes sense. Sort of. Stay tuned.

A couple of pledges:

No future entry will be crazy long. They are meant to be read and enjoyed and not heavily pondered.

They won’t all be about journaling. That would get old. My goal is to offer a brief diversion, maybe a relatable laugh, and encourage you to write something down. Something funny, something poignant, maybe even something boring because your present day boring may not seem so boring when you’re looking back.